The New Male Vanity? 27 Case Studies

Russell Brand is an emplary 21st-century dandy, an interesting case of self-deprecating self-absorption and stylistic splendor. He is a sort of narcissist who has journeyed through the looking glass, emerging wiser yet no less self-concerned. In a way the premise of Forgetting Sarah Marshall is the tension between the cockiness of his rock-star character and the neurotic self-doubt of the Jason Segel character, the prototypical American schlub. Brand's polymorphous perversity and louche self-regard sets the contemporary standard for enlightened shamanic narcissism. This is not narcissism in the sense of Narcissus confusing his reflection for another and pining away because of its unavailability; this is self-regard honed razor sharp through a continuous self-challenging auto-flirtation. When asked if America would accept him, he replied, "I'll not be changing, but America will."

Photo: The Kobal Collection/Apatow Productions

The British artist, dandy, and memoirist Sebastian Horsley is a slightly more literary, considerably less fit, and utterly more unrepentant form of the post-Wilde self-experimenter than Brand. Horsley will not have the opportunity to change America—at least not live, though possibly on film—as he was turned back at the border for "moral turpitude" on the basis of his book Dandy in the Underworld. Horsley's fashion sense is the opposite of the founding dandy Beau Brummell in that he would consider not turning heads in the street to be a sin of omission. I would advance his claim to sainthood, both sartorially and philosophically, on the basis of his instinctive but studied wholesale challenge to standing standards.

Photo: Catwalking.com

The most noted American dandies are obviously our movie stars. In this most publicity driven of nations a man can only be considered "best-dressed" if he is a celebrity, and celebrity can no longer be achieved by dress alone. Two of my worst-dressed friends have been nominated for such honors, and though I won't name them, I will say that they pass for well-dressed in this casual-Friday country by being non-obese famous men. Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt, and Robert Downey Jr. have all kept to a high standard of sartorial splendor. Of course in the mediocracy state we can expect the most famous men to also be considered the best dressed but these actors actually do comport themselves with great style.

Photo: Retna Ltd.

Depp shows that the bohemian is not dead, presenting himself as a character of which all of his characters partake, like a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn, and a king, but never the bourgeois tool. His affection for hats has helped redeem that outcast accessory, putting it back on top where it belongs. He dresses as a man should, to conjure and illustrate a sensibility and a mood. In perhaps his greatest role, as Lord Rochester in Libertine, he captures the spiritual and political essence of the dandy as artist and rebel.

Photo: Weinstein Company/Courtesy Everett Collection

Brad Pitt has transcended his handsomeness with as much panache as Paul Newman brought to the same problem. He has played it cool, embracing hunkiness without trying to hide it, and becoming a scholar of its historical manly affectations, from lumpen Las Vegasisms to 1%er MC scruff. And when he wears fashion he wears it with the balls of Achilles. His second degree sartorial sensibility is what made Clooney's Ocean's Eleven line work: "Ted Nugent called—he wants his shirt back."

Photo: Retna Ltd.

Downey, who has posed for as many mug shots as any man in Hollywood, has daring good taste, perhaps sublimating his earlier forms of wildness into an affection for risky color and old-school spiff.

Photo: Jason Merritt/Getty Images

But you don't have to be famous to be a great dresser. Some of the guys I respect most for what they do after showering are not household names. Tim Hunt, curator at the Andy Warhol Foundation and a veteran member of the Oord University Dangerous Sports Club, is as fearless at the tailor as he is on the ski slopes. No lackey of Savile Row, Tim hunts down tailors down in exotic Chinese neighborhoods, commissioning bespoke garments with bolts of fabric never intended to form lapels.

You've probably never heard of Duncan Hannah. If you are into contemporary realist painting maybe you have, but Duncan is one of our most committed Anglophiles and a lifelong dandy. Vain? No. Vanity? The good kind. Visiting his house in country is like a quick trip to the Cotswolds. A protégé of the great Richard Merkin, Duncan's subject matter is more up the Balthus/Nabokov alley. He never saw a schoolgirl in uniform he didn't like.

Here's Duncan in tweed and bags, backed by a nautical painting and some of his Penguin cover paintings.

And here's Duncan during his screen ingénue days with Debbie Harry, in Amos Poe's Unmade Beds.

Speaking of artists, here is the very famous and major painter Alex Katz and his beautiful wife Ada. Alex is one of those artists who knows about art but also knows the art of living. Look at the perfection of his evening clothes. No flash, just subtle perfection. From his athletic figure and perfect tailoring, to his immaculately tousled tie to his just-right hankie, Alex is flawless. Miles Davis would have said "that Alex Katz is as clean as a dog's dick." Sorry Ada. Vanity? He gives himself his props. This is self-respect at its best.

One would expect self-respecting artists to look at least as good as movie stars, and as we see, some of them do. But what about art critics or, dare I say it, art gossip columnists? Here is Adrian Dannatt, who was the gossip columnist for the Art Newspaper until he moved to Paris recently, and is also a great curator who mounted the salacious "Naked" exhibition at the Paul Kasmin Gallery and responded to the New Museum's "Younger Than Jesus" exhibition (featuring artists under 33) with his own "Wiser than God" show across the street at the BLT Gallery—featuring artists over 85. Adrian's show was arguably better.

Here he is in perfect tailoring, wearing a knit tie as it should be worn, and looking jaded and intimidating.

And Dannatt as the insatiable flirt. Vain? Not if it works.

Musicians, being stage performers and thus un-retouchable while working, tend to be very clothes-conscious. Some of our most visually extraordinary gentlemen work in this profession. I find Mr. Andre Benjamin to be the most sartorially splendid of them all.

Photo: Jon Furniss/WireImage

From the daring …

Photo: Jeffrey Mayer/WireImage

…to the sublime.

Nobody, but nobody does it better.

Photo: Stephen Shugerman/Getty Images

But there are crooners who can be as utterly true to their own persona, such as Mr. Jarvis Cocker, the British Parisian who sings with Pulp when not doing his own act. Mr. Cocker claims that he is a thrift shopper, but I doubt that thrift has anything to do with it. Being out of time, maybe not anachronistic as much as contrachronistic, has more to do with it, is my guess.

Photo: Retna Ltd.

He's not a fancy man. He spurns perfection. His studied "offness" makes him a sort of Thelonian dresser. If he's off key it's on purpose. But the silhouette says it all.

Photo: Retna Ltd.

Accidentally, on purpose would describe the style of my friend Wayne Maser, a great photographer. It was Wayne who first dragged me to Anderson Sheppard on Savile Row, although he's gone Italian on me. Actually he lives there most of the time and I suspect Caraceni is his tailor. Wayne likes his suits tight and he's always complaining that he's fat. He's not anorexic but he talks like he is. Here's Wayne during his twist-'em cufflink period. He would actually buy certain cakes so he could get the gold twist-'ems.

Wayne is always careful to get it perfectly wrong. He's probably sockless, and might be missing shoelaces or wearing a really tight polo under his dress shirt instead of a T-shirt. The way he goes off makes you rethink the whole idea.

Wayne is best pals with Lapo Elkann, who is sort of the most famous man in Italy. It's not just because he is a Fiat heir and got in some trouble a few years ago. In Italy you can be famous for the way you dress. That's Lapo. And he makes some cool stuff like sunglasses and motorcycle armor in case you fall off your Ducati doing a ton on the Autostrada.

Lapo is not vain, he's very effective. But he is proud. Look at the size of this logo!

You've got to hand it to Lapo. He knows branding. If he can brand himself like this, what can he do for a brand brand?

Lapo is the grandson of Gianni Agnelli, one of the most famous dressers of the modern era, and apparently Lapo inherited his grandpa's wardrobe. He knows how to run the gamut from elegant to bizarre.

Photo: Peter Dench/Corbis

Note the Italian flags on the cuffs. If he can rebrand himself and the Fiat 500, why not Italy?

Photo: AP Images

To gnarly…note the Dr. Evil finger move. Lapo's not showing off with the way he dresses. He means business.

Photo: AP Images

Dressing well is good for business. André Balazs, the hotelier, knows that and you'll never find him dressed down, just dressed or undressed. André always looks tan, fit, and sharp. He's one of the few guys out there keeping a high-end Rat Pack look alive. And now that the Standard Hotel has brought a Vegas-type lounge to the Manhattan skyline, André is living large.

Photo: Peggy Sirota

Knight Landesman, the publisher of Artforum, is almost like the mayor of Chelsea. He knows everyone in the art world, and vice-versa. One of his trade secrets is no secret. Knight always dresses so he can be seen from a hundred yards. He loves color. Vanity? Heavens no! He's as nice as they come. It's Visibility!

Photo: Zach Hyman/PatrickMcMullan.com

Knight in tartan, with a Richard Prince muscle car.

Photo: PatrickMcMullan.com

And Knight in red.

Photo: Scott Morgan/PatrickMcMullan.com

Some men find that one single trademark look that works for them and helps imprint them in people's minds. You can tell when they really enjoy it. Peter Marino, a great architect, used to dress like other architects. Then one day it seemed that he decided that if he had one life to live he was going to live it as a leather man.

A man should dress with an idea of who he is and what he can do and what he can express. In recent years we have seen fashion aspire to be art, and often vice-versa. But dressing is truly an art because it is transformative. It elevates and focuses the self, but also society. A man dresses with an idea of who he is and what a man should be. He may be entrusted with keeping that idea alive. Like Olivier Zahm of Purple Fashion.

Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg.

Photo: Reg Lancaster/Getty Images

Or reviving endangered traditions of artistic dress. Vogue's Hamish Bowles is always decorative, but he can also be challenging, as he is here in a Fornasetti raincoat.

Photo: Nick Hunt/PatrickMcMullan.com

And fearless, or as some would say, fierce.

Photo: Neil Rasmus/PatrickMcMullan.com

In a drab age a man must display color and give the chromatic spectrum its due, as does London tailor Ozwald Boateng.

Photo: Tim Whitby/WireImage

Clothing should inspire the wearer and those who behold him. It should make a man feel noble, like a king.

In fashion the emperors may be naked, but there are still those with style fit for a king. Observe the perfection, the measure, the subtlety and care this prince displays.

Here's the Prince of Wales in a bohemian tie.

Photo: POOL/ Tim Graham Picture Library/Getty Images

A green king can display a leek as a boutonniere.

Photo: Chris Jackson/Getty Images

Or wear the colors of his old gang with pride.

Photo: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Or appreciate the subtle variations that make a uniform significant.

Photo: POOL/Tim Graham Picture Library/Getty Images

A real king can be casually regal.

Photo: Tim Graham/Getty Images

We are building a new world here. Every man will not be a king. It wouldn't suit him. But there'll be at least four kings in every deck, not to mention the jacks and the queens.

You don't need to see his papers. You can tell the new aristocrat by the way he wears his hat or ties his tie, the way he does the frug, butters his toast, rides his Vespa, or winks his eye.

Like Parisian shopkeeper and boulevardier Vincent Darre, who shows a Ph.D. in texture (pictured with Leelee Sobieski, quite significant other of designer Adam Kimmel.)

Tom Ford demonstrating a demanding commitment to the lap of luxury and a positivist self-regard. Tom is helping to redefine vanity. What he does looks like vanity, but it's not frivolous. He's serious about it. It's like introspection conducted from the outside.

Photo: Neil Rasmus/PatrickMcMullan.com

His neo-classical approach reminds us in some ways of that of two-time "Sexiest Man Alive" winner George Clooney. Clooney's not flashy. He's subtle and ironic and cool. He's single, he lives in Italy, and he shaves when he wants to. His apparent content makes him appear to be a sort of non-proselytizing philosopher. But Clooney cares and his art gently pushes the world toward, um, joie de vivre and live and let live.

Perhaps there's something to be studied here. Maybe there is a new male attitude that's taking over, a way of looking at the world with confidence and a contented generosity. Yes, there's still war and greed and fear, but maybe a new attitude can wash that all away with a smile, a laugh.

Photo: Retna Ltd.

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